Midnight Magic (6 page)

Just as he didn’t doubt the man’s knowledge of how many sheaves of wheat and sacks of barley and oats were harvested each year; how much was kept for the lord’s use and how much could be sold at what price.

He would understand all this eventually, but for now Alberic took contentment in sitting atop a quality horse, watching the work being done.

Lords might come and go, but the tenants’ work didn’t halt, each task to its season. Given, of course, that some army didn’t come along and burn their homes and crops. He’d seen plenty of blackened timbers and scorched fields these past years, but hadn’t contemplated the effect of the war on the common people until now, when they were his people. His crops. His livelihood.

The risk of harm came from directions other than an attacking army. Either lack of or an overabundance of rain. Pestilence. Early or late frost.

But then there were the sheep. Hale and hardy Shropshires. One needed only meadows and freedom from disease to make a success of raising sheep, or so he thought. And this lovely corner of Shropshire provided an abundance of grazing land upon its gently rolling hillsides.

The streams ran thick with trout and salmon. Hart and hare populated the woodlands. And he could hardly wait to fly the gyrfalcons against the herons and cranes.

He watched the oxen make their turn at the end of the long row, then wheeled his horse southward. Sedwick and Odell fell in with him. The other guards marched behind.

“Two villages?” he asked Sedwick.

“Two villages, three hamlets, and scattered settlements. All in all, between the castle and the rest, nigh on three hundred or so people are dependent upon Camelen. And we on them. Most are decent, hardworking folk. We have our troublemakers, of course. You will meet them soon enough in your court, I fear.”

He’d never passed judgment before, not levied a fine or demanded added service, nor sentenced a man to the stocks or the gallows. Another thing he would learn by doing. A study of the judgments issued by Hugh would be of help.

“Craftsmen?”

“Blacksmith, tanner, dyer.” Sedwick smiled. “God’s truth, my lord, we have too many to name. We even have a bard who calls Camelen home.”

Alberic vaguely remembered hearing the strains of a harp both before the vigil and after the burial. But what he remembered was very nicely done.

“Welsh?”

“The best kind.”

Alberic had to agree, though his experience with Welshmen wasn’t usually in a hall. Those who raided Cheshire had been considered sword fodder, except when the earl needed troops. Then Chester wasn’t above hiring anyone capable of wielding any type of weapon, including Welshmen.

“Have we many Welsh?”

“A few. Most came with Lady Lydia when she married Sir Hugh, or shortly thereafter. Rhys, the bard, of course. One of her ladyship’s handmaidens married the blacksmith. There are a few others, among them soldiers in the garrison.”

“And all is peaceful?”

“Oh, we suffer a raid here and there. A sheep or two go missing. But mostly they have left us alone, before out of respect for Lady Lydia, and now for her daughters.”

The first village was in sight, but Alberic wasn’t yet ready to visit. He reined in, and Sedwick halted.

“How does an English baron come to marry a Welsh princess?”

Sedwick thought for a moment, then answered, “Sir Hugh met her ladyship at court. Her father was among a Welsh delegation sent to petition King Henry for one thing or another. Hugh told me he took one look at the beautiful Lydia and lost both his heart and ability to speak. Apparently the father and daughter were amenable to the match.”

“I gather the king did not object.”

“Not that I am aware of.”

Hugh had married for love? Alberic nudged his horse forward, mulling over the oddity.

Surely, for a Welsh prince and an English king to agree to the match, there had been considerations to the bargain other than a baron’s attraction to a princess.

Normally, barons were given heiresses by their overlords, either as a reward or to seal an alliance. Love deserved no place in a marriage contract between nobles, not when lands and wealth were at stake.

As with his own marriage; by marrying one of the de Leon daughters, Alberic sealed his claim to Sir Hugh’s estates. Neither attraction nor love had aught to do with his decision of which daughter to choose.

That King Stephen had given Alberic the right to choose among the females might be an oddity, but that the king retained guardianship of the other two wasn’t. In time, Stephen would exploit those rights in whatever way he saw fit.

Though Alberic hadn’t yet decided which of the three would become his wife, he’d caught himself noticing Gwendolyn more than the other two. Of course, Nicole was too young to appeal. Emma’s illness hadn’t prevented her from attending to her duty toward her father and brother, but when her presence wasn’t required, she’d taken to her bed. She struck him as a pale reflection of Gwendolyn.

Gwen, as her sisters called her, certainly possessed a lovely face and a hardy constitution. The curve of her backside wasn’t hard to look at, either. Aye, he’d have no problem with taking those lovely curves into his bed.

She’d been upset over his ring when they’d parted last eve. He’d half expected her to take him to task over it when he’d come across her this morn.

Perhaps she’d come to terms with his possession of the seal of the dragon, and thus his lordship of Camelen, for she’d not mentioned it. But then, he’d found her in the midst of a most unpleasant duty, and she’d been preoccupied.

He hadn’t lied when admiring her courage, and admired it even more when he’d walked into the lord’s bedchamber and felt the emptiness. If the sparseness of the room had affected him, he could imagine how clearing it of her father’s belongings must have affected Gwendolyn.

Still, she hadn’t appeared overly distraught. And that, too, he had to admire. ’Twas no wonder Hugh left her in charge of the household in his absence.

Alberic rode into the village he’d been in briefly yesterday when putting Hugh and William to rest under the floor of the church at the far end of the village green.

As in most villages, the huts were constructed of wattle and daub, the roofs thatched. Geese and chickens pecked about in the yards, which sported patches of newly overturned earth, ready for planting gardens once the danger of frost passed.

Several women stood at the common well, buckets in hand, paying more attention to one another than the squealing children who chased around them.

As the children became aware of his approach, their squeals faded and the women turned to stare. He acknowledged curtsies and bows with nods, progressing slowly so all could get a good look at both him and the ring.

“Do you wish to stop, my lord?” Sedwick asked.

“At the church.”

“I believe Father Paul is at the castle.”

“’Tis not the priest I wish to visit.”

Long ago he’d learned how deeply a show of piety could influence the peasantry. Ranulf de Gernons, the earl of Chester, might be a harsh and self-serving man, but a visit to church earned him approval. Alberic meant to stop only long enough to light a votive candle, allowing all to think he did so in honor of the old lord. If the pretense didn’t aid his cause, for certes it could do him no harm.

He dismounted near the church steps.

The children’s curiosity got the better of them, and when they gathered around to ogle the men in chain mail and to admire the horses, the women and the few men about crowded around, too.

Alberic smiled down at one particularly grubby, flush-faced urchin, remembering his own early childhood spent in a village not unlike this one. Barefoot, garbed in a tunic of rough weave, he’d once chased with other children around a common well.

A hitch in his heartbeat accompanied the many memories.

Most of them were of his mother, scraping out a living as the village brewer. He’d never doubted her love for him, or that she did all she could to make them comfortable, and done very well. Not until near the end had she told him about his father, and of the few pence the earl sent each month to keep her from telling others of his youthful misadventure.

At times Alberic wished she’d kept her secret. At others, like now, he felt grateful. He’d endured much growing up at the fringe of Chester’s shadow, but the final gain was well worth the hardships he’d suffered. He now had the means to prove himself worthy of the earl of Chester’s acknowledgment, and he meant to make the most of the opportunity.

Alberic squatted down to face the boy nose to nose. “What is your name, lad?”

The boy’s eyes went wide, likely surprised to hear English from his lord rather than Norman-French.

“Edward . . . milord.”

“A good English name.”

“Me mum says she named me after the great Confessor.”

“Then you must strive to do justice to the name.” He tilted his head. “Your nose met the ground today. Did it hurt?”

The boy rubbed at the smudge of dirt. “Nay.”

A woman’s work-worn hands landed on the boy’s shoulders. Alberic looked up to see a short, round female, gray streaking her otherwise brown hair.

“Beggin’ yer pardon, milord. Did me boy do somethin’ he ought not?”

Alberic realized he probably shouldn’t have given in to the urge to talk to the boy. Most lords didn’t bother to notice a peasant child, much less deign to talk to him. In doing so, he’d frightened the boy’s mother.

Alberic rose up. “He has done nothing wrong, mistress. Indeed, he seems a fine lad.”

Relief and pride mingled in her toothy smile. “I believe so. If I can be so bold, milord, might I ask after the ladies of the castle?”

“All are well.”

“Lady Emma, too?”

“I believe I heard someone say she recovers.”

“Praise be. Poor dear. She suffers so. Would you be kind enough to tell Lady Gwendolyn—”

“Mistress Biggs, his lordship is not a messenger!”

Sedwick’s admonition pricked Alberic’s ire, hearing again the haughty Norman treatment of the English. He might look Norman, might speak English with the undertones of the Norman-French he’d been forced to learn and use after coming under Chester’s influence. But Lord above, he couldn’t bring himself to forswear his peasant roots, or treat this woman with less courtesy than he would a noble lady.

He shot Sedwick a disapproving glance before addressing Mistress Biggs. “What is it you wish Lady Gwendolyn to know?”

Unsure of herself, she pressed her lips together before gathering her courage. “That we miss her, milord.”

“You are accustomed to seeing her often?”

The woman nodded. “Once a sennight, at the least. She . . . she brings out medicines and spare clothin’, and bread what’s got burned on the bottom.”

“She tends to the villagers’ needs.”

Another bob of head. “Seems she does not mind tendin’ the likes of us, like Lady Emma. Hard to say how we would get along without Lady Gwendolyn’s care.”

“What of Nicole?”

Her smile returned. “Betimes she comes with Lady Gwendolyn. The girl likes to play with the children.”

What manner of noble child played with peasant children?

“Nicole chases with them?”

“Oh, heaven forbid, no, milord! That would be undignified!”

He almost laughed at her horror, but managed restraint.

“Then what do they play?”

Wariness replaced her horror. She waved a dismissive hand. “Oh, this and that.”

Which was no answer at all.

“We play empress and earls,” Edward blurted out, supplying the information his mother hesitated to reveal.

Everyone went still, and Alberic wished he’d had the good sense not to pursue the matter. Certes, he didn’t have to ask who assumed the role of empress.

In Alberic’s opinion, Nicole had chosen her role poorly.

Though she preferred to be called empress, Maud had lost the title upon the death of her first husband, the emperor of Germany. Her father had then given her in marriage to Geoffrey, the count of Anjou, a hefty step down in her eyes. Nor did she rule over the earls loyal to her, for she possessed no true ruling power in England.

Several years ago, with King Stephen captured, Maud had been given a chance at obtaining her goal. She’d proved so arrogant and greedy that her support in London quickly vanished, leaving her vulnerable to forces raised by Queen Matilda. So had ended her reign as Lady of the English, with a hasty, undignified retreat.

Why Nicole would wish to liken herself to such a woman Alberic couldn’t guess.

“Are you an earl?”

The boy had caught his mother’s wariness, but he also knew he must answer. In a very small voice he admitted, “Reginald, earl of Cornwall.”

One of Maud’s half brothers and one of her staunchest allies.

“I fear you must give up your earldom, Edward. Perhaps on Lady Nicole’s next visit, she can be Queen Matilda and petition the king to grant you the earldom of York.”

The boy’s nose scrunched in confusion. “But who shall be king?”

“One of you lads must prove himself worthy of the title.”

He shook his head. “Nicole will loathe having to ask one of us for permission to name her earls. She likes givin’ orders on her own.”

Alberic bit back another laugh and ruffled the boy’s hair. “Such are the fortunes of war, lad. King Stephen is now our overlord, and I cannot have Maud and her earls mucking about in the village now, can I?”

Knowing a retreat was in order, and allowing himself to regroup and the villagers to breathe easier, Alberic turned to go into the church. He had no more than put a foot on the bottom stair when an arrow whizzed past his head and bit deep into the church’s solid oak door.

“Attack!” one of his guards shouted. “Get down, my lord!”

Alberic paid the order no heed, spinning around to look in the direction from which the arrow must have come. He saw no one with a bow in hand. Indeed, he saw few people at all.

Already the villagers had scattered, fleeing to the safety of their homes. ’Struth, he didn’t suspect any of the group of treachery. The arrow had to have come from the edge of the woodland.

He started for his horse. Sedwick caught him by the sleeve.